Environmental industry

Liquefaction is a destructive phenomenon which usually takes place after an earthquake in areas with water-saturated soil or sand. During the liquefaction process, soil loses its strength and can no longer support structures and buildings which often leads to their destruction. To prevent damages associated with liquefaction, it is critical to study this phenomenon and understand its underlying mechanisms. One approach to study liquefaction is through computer simulation using the discrete element method.

Stakeholders from all business sectors are increasingly looking to businesses to address pressing social and/or environmental issues. Co-operatives are facing the same challenges, and must also use non-financial indicators to demonstrate their co-operative difference.
The purpose of this project is to develop a web-based searchable database of existing tools and frameworks to measure social and environmental performance of business and enterprises.

The Canadian paint and coating industry had long established programs to collect residual paint from the household and recycle it into marketable products. By doing so, the industry protects the environment by recycling a significant amount of resources which used to end up in landfills as waste. However, such programs are currently costly for both the companies and consumers, due to extra costs of collecting and recycling.

This project will focus in new product/services development based on customer preferences and experiences in the wine shop. With this we intend to get insights into what current Cedar Creek customers are interested in with regards to potential new products and services. In particular, we want to understand the potential for offering new products and services focused in the concept of sustainability. Furthermore, we want to understand what are the motivations that would foster a customer to purchase a sustainably-produced wine.

The Centre for Sustainable Development at Simon Fraser University has been a leader in sustainable development theory and practice, in Canada and internationally, since 1989. The Centre stimulates sustainable development research and study in BC and elsewhere; collects and provides information about sustainable development; carries out sustainable development projects in partnership with communities and agencies, and facilitates effective use of university resources in responding to requests for assistance on sustainable development problems.

Salt marshes are important coastal ecosystems because they provide many services to surrounding areas. Due to the high fertility of salt marsh soil, they have a long history of being converted to farmland in Maritime Canada. In recent years, there has been growing interest in restoring salt marshes to protect against coastal erosion, mitigate sea level rise, and provide increased habitat for birds, fish, etc.

Pacific salmon are important from ecological, economic, social and cultural perspectives, but many species in the Salish Sea have seen drastic decrease in marine survival rate in recent decades, likely linked to reduced survival of the young stages of salmon due to a combination of environmental, food web changes, and human impacts. This activity will provide an ecosystem-level analysis of how the environmental productivity of the Salish Sea has changed in recent decades with focus on the implications this has had for salmon populations in the area.

While trees are regularly maintained to prevent damage from branches to power lines, power outages caused by vegetation still occur, and these outages are more common in some areas of London than in others. This work will correlate tree species-specific growth rates, tree species distribution maps, and topographical maps with the frequency of vegetation-related power outages across London, ON to determine potential drivers of tree growth (such as species identity, tree size, and indices of water availability) that should be accounted for in future vegetation maintenance plans.

The proposed research project will take place on three nature reserves owned by the Nature Conservancy of Canada (NCC) (Miscou, NB â 780 acres, Escuminac, NB â 630 acres, Salmonier, NL â 440 acres), where NCC wants to understand how the land is being used by the community, the motivation and beliefs of those using it, and options for behaviour change to prevent damage to sensitive habitats.

It is well established that livestock producers are effective land stewards and contribute to high productivity and wildlife habitat on grazed lands. The effectiveness of many management practices are established, but uncertainty remains, particularly in interactions between practices at large-scales. We propose to track grazing patterns of bison and cattle using GPS collars at the Nature Conservancy of Canadas (NCC) Old Man on His Back Conservation Area (OMB) in response to various strategies (e.g. burning, fencing, weed control) over 3 years at multiple scales of observation (e.g.